Friday, November 21, 2008

Today I decided that I wanted the hoodie so badly that I would order it. Probably one of the biggest factors pushing me into it was finding an order code that is part of their "friends and family" sale, thanks to another blogger, that will get me 30% off. So I set about ordering the Boba Fet hoodie and a cool Star Wars T-shirt (yes, Star Wars is cool).

Half way through my ordering process I get to the address section and it won't let me change the country from US to Canada. ECKO's online store won't ship outside of the US!! The horror. It's not even over seas, we're connected for gods sake!

Anyways, I've heard a few good stories over the past year about people talking about their problems with companies over social media and the companies sometimes respond. Usually positively. So I decided to give it a try.

I've mentioned my problem several times on Twitter. I made a small post about it on my Tumblr mini-blog, and now I'm writing about it here.

I'm hoping that if I mention it enough, something will get done. That's why I'm asking anyone who reads this to pass it on. Especially Canadians like me who also like ECKO gear, because maybe one day you won't be able to get something you really want shipped to you. Maybe you even know someone who is connected to ECKO in some way. You should pass this on to them.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Here's my next installment of I WANT IT, just in case anyone wants to get me a holiday present of any sort. *wink wink* *nudge nudge*

This time though it's not one thing, it's a whole collection of things. Hoodies to be exact.

Anyone who knows me in real life knows that I love hoodies. I also love star wars.

While clicking through another site I was taken to the Ecko clothing site, where I found a whole collection of limited edition Star Wars clothes. Everything there is cool, but the hoodies are awesome. Check out the Boba Fet one I have posted here in the blog, or click through to the page and check out the awesome Storm Trooper hoodie.

I should be an archaeologist, cause I love making new discoveries. And yesterday I made two amazing ones.

First of all, do you notice anything different here today? Perhaps something new in the side bar?

That's right, there seems to be some sort of a mini-blog feed in the sidebar. This is the result of both my awesome discoveries. Let me tell you all about them...

The other day I got an email from Twitter telling me that some new person is following my feed. As I usually do, I proceeded to check out this new person. And again, as I usually do, I clicked on this persons webpage just to see what they're all about. This is where I found something different. Instead of being taken to this persons company page or traditional blog, it took me to their Tumblr blog. What's a Tumblr blog you may ask (I know, because that's what I did)?

I can only describe Tumblr as a mirco-blogging site. It's not mirco-blogging like Twitter, but more of an actual scaled down blog to put up quick, random, small posts. It seems to interact very easily with mediums like audio, links, pictures and videos. It make's them easy to link to or upload, and then gives you space to write a caption to go along with whatever you just posted. This will come in really handy for when I want to share a link I just found, or a video or whatever, without having to make a full big blog post for it. I'm also fairly sure people can subscribe to Tumblr sites using RSS too.

The second thing I discovered, is what allowed me to feed my Tumblr blog into my sidebar here. I found something called a Blidget. My basic understanding of this device is that you can essentially make a mini-feed for any of your blogs that you can then embed into another blog or website. All I had to do was type my Tumblr blogs URL into a box, then it made the widget for me. I got to customize how I wanted it to look and what I wanted it to show, and four mins after I found it, I had a mini-blog stream ready to be placed inside my larger blog.

It's a well known fact that I may love my iPhone more than a mother loves her first born child. It's also a well known fact that I'm a broke cheap student. However, on the recommendation of my buddy Dave Senior, I purchased my first iPhone app. Everything up till now has been free programs.

I bought a program called RJDJ which stands for Reality Jockey DJ. It's a super cool program that remixes real life to totally trip you out.

The program uses the phones microphone from the earphones (that means it only works for the iPhone, and not the touch) and grabs pieces of sound and plays them back in different manners depending on which track you're using. I know that was a bad explanation, but you really need to try it to see how cool it really is. For instance, one of the tracks takes everything it hears and makes it echo back and forth between your ears at different pitches each time. Another track adds ambient noises to the noise it's already picking up.

I'll let the guy who designed it give you a better explanation:

I highly recommend everyone gets this program, then goes walking through a supermarket, or sit on a busy subway, or walk around the business district around lunch, or start walking around talking to yourself. It's highly worth the $2.99 I paid for the RJDJ Album with all the tracks, but it also comes in a RJDJ Single with only one track.

Sunday, November 16, 2008

A few weeks ago I wrote a blog about how it's hard at times to get involved in social media when none of your "real life" friends are into it. Aside from facebook, most of my friends don't belong to other social mediums. I'm pretty sure, out of all the people I follow and who follow me on Twitter, only three of them are friends in real life. And one of them never uses Twitter, she just has an account.

I just wanted to say that not all of my experiences in discovering and learning and interacting in social mediums have been hard efforts. Specifically, Twitter.

When I first joined Twitter, which was late in the game already, I did an email search for my friends and only came up with two people. So what was I going to do?

I started using Twitter's search section and looking for people in Toronto and things I'm interested in, like; PR, marketing, social media, etc. I quickly built up a list of just under 100 people The problem was..., they were complete strangers. I didn't know where to start either, so I just started posting stupid shit that popped into my head. A few people would write the random comment back @ me, but mostly I would just read what other people were talking about.

After a little while I started to get a feel for some of the people I was following, and would write something to them if I felt strongly about something they had said. The more comfortable I was becoming with this new online world, the easier it became for me to be myself and not just be some online guy. I was me, just online.

I was thinking about that the other day, and it reminded me of something I get told a lot in my PR classes: allow yourself to be fully visible and people will appreciate it. Sure, when my teachers say it they're mainly talking about companies and organizations, but it seems to work everywhere. People always tell you when you're going to meet new people "just be yourself." Apparently it also works online.

Once I started just being myself I've made a lot of friends via Twitter. I'm not just talking about how I've picked up more followers, but more that they're actual friend-type characters. People who know about things going on in my life. People whose lives I know about. People who just say "what up". But I consider them friends. I've learned about all sorts of new things from people on Twitter, and I'm also not afraid to ask people questions about anything. In fact, I've even been looking to get some experience in the PR and social media field and advertising it on Twitter. Some people who could, have been very helpful, and I've even had people who weren't on my list contact me about it.

So now I've totally lost where I was completely going with this post, but I feel better about saying what I did. So if anyone is reading this, I guess my message is if you can be a real person on social mediums people will see the genuineness (I'm pretty sure that's a real word) and you can make some real friends. Some of them may even come in handy to know one day.

Also, since Twitter's search has been down forever now, here's a good site for finding some people on Twitter with similar interests. Just Tweet It allows you to search for tweeters with similar interests, as well as post your Twitter profile under your interests for other people to find you. Check out Just Tweet It here.

In anticipation of next years movie, I read the Watchmen comic book a couple of months ago.

I now understand how a comic book (ahem, graphic novel) made TIME magazines top 100 novels of all time list.

It's an amazing story, and I'm really excited to see the movie, because I know they tried to keep it true to the comic.

Anyways, regardless of if you've read the comic or not (but I recommend you do), if you weren't excited for this movie before, the new trailer released this week should get you in the mood. It looks amazing!!!!

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

So, I've been a little busy with school lately and haven't had time to write anything else, but I'm back and I'll try not to stay away for long periods of time.

Anyways, I've decided to add something to my blog.

I love gadgets. Gadgets of all sorts. Problem is, being a student I can't afford most slash all of them. From now on, every once and a while I'll post a blog titled "I Want It" where I can show something I want, but can't afford, in hopes that someone else will find a way to get it for me. Wishful thinking, I know.

This jacket is awesome. I'm a snowboarder in the winter, and I love when I can hear music while I'm boarding. Problem is, having earphones on/in your ears can be somewhat "unsafe."

This jacket has bluetooth technology that gets music from your phone and plays it through speakers in the hood. And if that's not cool enough, there's an awesome cyborg-like controller built into the arm so you can control the music without taking your phone out of your pocket. It also works for making calls with your phone through the bluetooth, which is just an added bonus since I was sold on the music part alone.